Movable Feast

 

Former McDonald's premises, St Peter's Square/Exchange Walk

There surely can't be too many people bemoaning the demise of the St Peter's Square/Exchange Walk McDonald's, which closed on 30 June. There are, after all, three other McDonald's 'restaurants' in the city centre. Quality local media outlet Nottinghamshire Live claimed that 'Shoppers in Nottingham city centre were left in complete shock' by the news, but I think we can take that with a pinch of salt.

For my part, I was once served a partially-frozen Sausage and Egg McMuffin at this location, so screw those guys.

Without the distraction of the McDonald's branding, the premises are not unattractive. The building is reminiscent of the former Woolworth/HMV/WH Smith store at the bottom of Lister Gate, and I particularly like the design above the former entrance.

This McDonald's seems to have opened in 1989. A Goad plan revision dating from May of that year gives the premises' status as 'TO BE MCDONALDS'.

Going back a little further in time, we can see from an April 1984 revision of the plan that most of the building is occupied by Lord John, a menswear chain whose first store was opened in 1964 on Carnaby Street in London. Lord John eventually ended up in the hands of Next.

Perhaps pre-dating the Lord John years, the photo below, from an undated sale brochure, shows the main part of the building being occupied by Jackson the Tailor, a chain that dated back to 1906 (with an original store in Newcastle) and merged with Burton in 1953.

As development of the city centre's southern gateway slowly gathers pace, it will interesting to see what the next chapter in the story of this particular building will be, and how it will affect the character of the area.